artisan cakes & cookies

Tag Archives: University of edinburgh

Oh yes. I made biscuits for a real life princess – Princess Mako of Japan, and didn’t even know! If the name sounds familiar, it’ll be because Princess Mako of Japan has been in the headlines quite a bit lately. The Princess, grand daughter of Emperor Akihito and member of the Japanese royal household is engaged to be married to a commoner.

Japanese law states that if the princess choses to marry a commoner then she must leave the royal family behind and become a normal civilian. There is concern about the Japanese royal family’s bloodline as the Emperor has just 3 grandchildren, two of whom are princesses and will marry and leave the royal family – and just one grandson to continue the line.

Not many people know but Princess Mako spent time living in Scotland a few years back when she studied at the University of Edinburgh for a year. It was while she was studying there that we had the opportunity to make biscuits for her and her friends.

One of her friends was organising a leaving party for the Princess who was heading back to Japan after completing her studies. The friend contacted me and requested a custom order of our personalised floral biscuits.

These are probably the most detailed and complex biscuits I have in my personalised biscuits portfolio but if I do say so myself, they are pretty stunning and delicious tasting of course.

Each biscuit has 3 separate layers of fondant icing – one layer of white fondant and the next layer a lovely pinky/peach colour fondant.

I then use a beautiful flower rubber stamp to decorate the fondant icing, which adds embossed detail. Rubber stamps are a great way to add detail fondant covered biscuits if, like me, you are not particularly good at free hand painting.

Next, each flower is hand painted using edible paint or as in this design, edible dusts that I mix with a small amount of water to to get an edible paint.

Lastly, each biscuit is personalised with a different name, again using rubber stamps, and then hand painted with a gold lustre dust. The finished effect is stunning – don’t you agree…?

I originally designed the biscuits for my daughter’s birthday and the inspiration for the design was a beautiful vintage scarf that I found in a second hand shop in Whitstable. My daughter loved the scarf and so I used the pattern as the basis of the design for her cake and cookies that year.

I loved making the biscuits for Princess Mako’s party and working with all those beautiful and unusual Japanese names.

I’ve made these biscuits in lots of different colours for weddings & events over the years. Here they are in pastel green and purple.

Thankfully, I didn’t know that I was making biscuits for royalty when Princess Mako’s order was placed, otherwise I think I might have been a complete bag of nerves!